


A selfish promise to fulfill

by Kazaha_87



Series: From hot embers back to fire [2]
Category: Kyou Kara Maou!
Genre: Because it's Murata after all XD, It's slightly spicier than Wolf's POV story, Light Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Murata POV third person, Rated Explicit for last chapter only, same story of the previous but from Murata's POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-24
Updated: 2017-06-01
Packaged: 2018-08-17 01:38:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 21,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8125507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kazaha_87/pseuds/Kazaha_87
Summary: The first time he had met him in Svelera he had almost had an heart attack; but if at start what he noticed were his resemblances with his first love, soon what he had started to perceive and appreciate about him had become the differences… and the two of them couldn’t be any more different than this, actually.He couldn’t see the blond’s expression from such a distance, but everything in his persona emanated pure misery… even his maryoku’s aura, and for a fire wielder it was inconceivable.Giving it no further thought for once and putting aside for a moment all his better judgment, he walked straight up there: he couldn’t stand to assist to that magnificent creature dying inside, day after day after day, any longer.…and maybe that was the day he would have found his courage back!





	1. Old Memories and Courage

**Author's Note:**

> To Sabrina and Gene, who supported me on the previous story that, otherwise, wouldn't have had a 'sequel'.
> 
> By the way, this is the same story of 'The Sage's Courtship Dance', but from Murata's POV and filling some gaps in the other story in a sort of filling missing scenes, so let's pry into our favorite perverted sage's head a little now! ;)
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy ;) And well... expect more perverted thoughts and stuff here! ;)

In the last week Lord von Voltaire had already asked for his presence by the castle _three_ times, every time with the excuse of trivial matters to solve in order to cover up for his real concern of the last few days.

It was nothing new to hear for him nor for everybody else inside those four walls – not after twelve years of nearly nonstop quarrels between the Maoh and his fiancé – but it seemed that the growing tension between those two was finally starting to affect the good ruling of the castle and, as a result, of the entire realm if even Lord von Voltaire had started to actively worry about it.

And, on the long run, Murata, as much as the concerned Gwendal, knew that, if that went on, that situation could have become a threat for their peace and brought to inside insurrections among the Ten Nobles Families; which could bring, in the worst case scenario, to a civil war…

Even if the sage knew that maybe for another ten years or so there was probably nothing to fear, he also knew that they could end to that future eventually.

Despite that, sadly, there was nothing he could do about that situation but watch powerless as much as everybody else at the development – and the progressive deteriorating – of his best friend’s and Lord von Bielefeld’s relationship.

 

…to be absolutely fair, _there was_ a way out: he only had to keep an eleven years old promise that he had selfishly made to himself and that was only waiting for him to take the courage to fulfill it.

… _only_ …

Easier said than done… in fact, it was almost two years already that, after fulfilling his ‘requirements’ to carry it out, he was postponing that possibility.

-&-

That afternoon, then, after his third worthless private meeting with the General in the man’s office, Murata speculated that maybe Lord von Voltaire had finally realized that there was really no meaning in asking him for advice about that specific matter, since that last gathering turned out to be mercifully a lot shorter than the previous ones.

_There was still light outside! …maybe he had to celebrate the incredible event._

He heaved a sigh. Then he checked the hour and sighed again.

For a moment he had hoped to see Shibuya and have a chat with him – absolutely _not_ about his beautiful but troublesome fiancé, because he was sure that there were far too many people eager to do that every single time they quarreled, that actually meant from one to three times a day when they were lucky – but it was too early and the Maoh wouldn’t have been available for a couple of hours at best given that it was time for his afternoon’s lesson with Lord von Christ about Shin Makoku’s history.

He sneered under his sleeve at the thought, because Shibuya’s worst subject at school, even worse than Japanese, had always been history.

A few years earlier, after that he had finally filled his four thousand years’ gap, he had suggested to both Lord von Christ and Shibuya to be the one to teach him about it in Gunter’s stead, but, even if Yuuri would have gladly accepted his offer, Lord von Christ had been adamant that the Great Sage of Shin Makoku couldn’t be just a mere teacher, even if that meant teaching to the Maoh, because he had ‘greater and more important matters to care about’, and there had been no way to persuade him otherwise.

…actually, since that day Ken had always thought that it was a pity, because it would have been such a nice diversion from his daily life at the temple! He had always loved, since his first life, to teach and tell stories, in fact, even if the best storyteller he had ever met in four thousand years of life was still the man that during his first one had been his brother.

Then, with his memory turned towards some distant past while he roamed around the castle courtyards, he instinctively raised his gaze on the south tower and glanced at the balcony Shinou had build for him, right out of what at the time were his private quarters and that now had just become a storing room for old stuff like he was…

By the way, the moment his eyes posed over the stone overhang up there, he winced.

He was so hung up in his old memories that for a moment he mistook the blond figure leaning forward the parapet for Shinou… the living Shinou, not the specter he was now.

But thinking twice, it wasn’t such an incomprehensible mistake he took there, because his descendant really resembled him a lot, at least in features.

His late brother insisted on repeating that Lord von Bielefeld resembled Rufus more than he resembled him, but, at least on the outer appearance, made exception for his big, beautiful and expressive green eyes and the slender body, he could never agree with him.

The first time he had met him in Svelera, in fact, he had almost had an heart attack; but if at start what he noticed were his resemblances with his first love, soon what he had started to perceive and appreciate about him had become the differences… and the two of them couldn’t be any more different than this, actually.

He couldn’t see the blond’s expression from such a distance, but everything in his persona emanated pure misery… even his maryoku’s aura, and for a fire wielder it was _inconceivable_!

Giving it no further thought for once and putting aside for a moment all his better judgment, he walked straight up there: he couldn’t stand to assist to that magnificent creature dying inside, day after day after day, any longer.

…and maybe that was the day he would have found his courage back!


	2. Eye Candy

He really could be a jerk sometimes… a perverted old man. And there was no need for Lord von Bielefeld to remind him of that: he knew that already!

...but the blond’s flustered face was such an enticing view that he really couldn’t find in himself the will to refrain his tongue when he was around him, especially in such an _unprecedented_ situation that saw them alone together.

_Jeez, he desired him so much!_

He was sure that, if he just stopped paying the maximum attention to his inner thirsts, he would have ended jumping on him anytime.

With a feral, hungry look at Wolfram’s perfect rear offering itself in all its magnificence, wrapped in those super-fitting pants of his, just in front of his eyes while he leaded the way to the training ground at a pretty brisk pace, he followed him across the courtyard and heaved a frustrated, low groan.

-&-

It wasn’t the first time for him to assist to Lord von Bielefeld’s training session, but he had never asked for that in advance and it had always been by chance before.

It was well known that the blond ex-prince liked to be watched and admired and that, the bigger the audience was, the more he shined; so, when he saw him lose against a recruit – and a new one no less, because he didn’t remember to have seen the man around before, and he really had a good memory for faces – he got just a bit surprised.

He saw him turn red in shame but bow and congratulate to his man regardless and Ken asked himself if, in the past, when he had known him, in a similar situation he would have done the same.

Then Wolfram threw a quick glance at him and, when he noticed that he was looking right his way, such as quickly he turned back again, faintly blushing.

_Really, that was called cheating!_

…another one like that and he seriously risked to have to deal with an erection in the middle of the courtyard!

He heaved the already hundredth sigh for that day while forcing himself to remain focused and to keep his animal instincts at bay.

So, when Wolfram turned towards him a few minutes later to show off after his victory against his second in command, a certain Andrew Meyer, second son of a minor noble family in the Gyllenhaal region, he forcefully smiled at him and slightly bowed in acknowledgement of his success in order to keep up appearances.

But when he saw Wolfram suddenly flush and abruptly turn his back again at him he couldn’t control himself anymore and lowly cursed at his own damn hormones.

For once he thanked all the Gods above that they were in public, because otherwise this time he was absolutely sure that he would have jumped him there and then.


	3. Trip Back

_Okay… that situation was starting to get awkward._

Murata was literally unable to keep his eyes off him!

He had even tried to lead the way and leave the blond to follow him behind on his horse, but even like that it just seemed that he couldn’t leave him alone. For some reason, in fact, he seemed unable to refrain himself from continuously turning back to watch at him, and not for a chat – otherwise it would have been normal to look in the face at the person he was talking to – … it was purely to watch, because his voice was tangled up in his throat and in that condition there was no way that he would have embarrassed himself attempting to put up a conversation of any sort with him.

So, in the end, he found it less mortifying to let Lord von Bielefeld lead the way and just watch him from behind…

And not that he couldn’t see the growing uneasiness in his beautiful escort the more they proceeded on their way to the temple, but he really could do nothing to help improve the atmosphere at the moment!

 

When they finally reached their destination, the air between them could be cut with a knife.

Wolfram’s cheeks were already slightly tinged in pink the moment Ken caught him at staring back at him, and the blond, flushing brighter the moment their gazes met, quickly looked away again.

In all his self-consciousness, then, Wolfram bid him farewell and was ready to leave when Ken didn’t even notice that he was talking until he heard his own voice asking: “What about keeping me company for dinner?”

When Murata realized, the first thought had been: ‘ _I hope it didn’t sound too desperate._ ’, but, by the look of it, his inner turmoil seemed still concealed inside him… or at least his striking object of his every desire just didn’t notice.

“You won’t be able to arrive to the castle in time for it anyway”, the sage added, ultra-careful not to lose his control and to keep his voice even, “and, after that, I would like to show you something.”, he risked and then paused, and by the time he realized his heart was pumping so hard that he didn’t even heard himself adding “if you won’t mind.”

This time he could almost touch Wolfram’s uncertainty, but by now, after the awkward ride there, he was pretty sure that the blond would have just declined.

So, when Wolfram asked him in an hesitant tone “…what is it that you want to show me?” he felt his own lips curve up in a still unbelieving smile.

He shook his head, still incredulous that the man he wanted for his own was even pondering seriously about taking on to his offer, and so, gaining confidence, in reply this time he dared a bolder “Stay for dinner and you’ll find out. Go, and you’ll never know” that left the already uncertain demon even more troubled than he already was for the next couple of minutes, when he finally took his decision and dismounted from his horse.

And when Wolfram did that, Ken started to breathe again.


	4. The Promise

“…it has always been like that between us: once it’s his fault and once it’s mine, so it’s nothing to get worried about.”, Ken just finished to explain to his guest his relationship with the First King, trying to reassure him after the unbefitting scene of him and Shinou arguing by the gate which he had been spectator of, but the moment his voice came out of his mouth he realized that he just sounded really worn-out more than reassuring.

“…it must be tiring…”, the blond commented in fact, suddenly lost in thought, and Ken could easily guess where the blond’s mind was heading to, because, in a way, his relationship with Shinou wasn’t much different from Lord von Bielefeld’s one with the Maoh.

“I have to kill time, somehow, don’t you think?”, the sage minimized then, smiling at him, and then moved to another more neutral topic.

“…by the way”, he went on, “I must apologize for the reduced dimension of my quarters here… and for my bad habit of leaving everything around. I’m always eager to bring out the stuff I’m interested in and just as much lazy when it comes the moment to put them back to their places… and I didn’t plan to invite you to stay today, otherwise I would have tidied up and made all these books disappear at least…”,

Totally out of the blue, Wolfram covered up his mouth with the back of his hand and started to chuckle.

“Sorry… it’s twelve years that we know each other, but it’s maybe the first time that I see the real you…”, Wolfram explained, maybe in order to justify his impolite behavior and laughter at his host’s expense. “It always seems that you plan everything in advance, even people’s behavior! It’s always as if you already know what they would say or do.”

After a really well concealed shock at the blond’s first words, Ken burst out laughing to cover up the embarrassment and he concentrated on the second – less debilitating – statement instead.

“I’m just good at improvising and at acting cool, but I’ll tell you a secret that I hope you won’t spread around”, and then he threw a conspiratorial look at Wolfram before going on. “I almost  _never_  plan anything in advance if not in broad terms, and absolutely not always… it’s better and more useful to be able to adapt to what shows in front of you rather than to plan everything in detail beforehand, because you should know by now that  _nothing_  ever goes like you plan it to go. Ever.”

“As much as you didn’t plan to invite me here today?”, the blond asked with a hint of mischief in his voice.

“...maybe", he responded then with the same tone, and then he added an "and definitely I did not plan to invite you here  _today_ ” with a soft, mysterious smile softening his square features, but the implications behind that last reply were so blatant that, for a moment, an embarrassed silence fell upon them… and luckily it was just a moment because a maid providentially knocked at the door with their dinner right that instant.

-&-

The atmosphere was back to normal and the conversation had gone back to the usual more irreverent tones when Wolfram slightly clouded over, kind of all of a sudden.

“…twelve years before discovering that you’re different from what I believed you were…”, he repeated in a more serious tone, this time, what he had already affirmed while laughing, and then, slightly dejected, he confessed: “I feel a little ashamed… I really misjudged you, and I’m sorry.”

“On the other hand, you’re exactly like I knew you were…”, Murata retorted, minimizing with a smile his own blunt statement. “But don’t torment yourself over such a trivial thing, my lord: I don’t like to be known, so it’s not completely your fault.”

“But still… I’m sorry.”, Wolfram repeated then, serious, not content of the first time. “Your company is really enjoyable. It’s such a pity that we wasted twelve years like that, arguing for nothing…”, the demon added, making things even worse for him, who was trying to distract himself in all possible ways so not to show on his face his herculean effort to remain calm and collected.

“But am I not a pervert and a slimy bastard?”, he retorted then instead with a mischievous light into his eyes and a forced half grin, and Wolfram turned slightly pink and diverted his gaze in response to that, luckily for Ken, too focused on his own embarrassment to notice his.

“…yes, you are.”, Wolfram replied, slightly mortified, with a brief pout that soon disappeared to leave room to a soft smile. “But it seems that there’s more under that perverted façade you always wear.”, he conceded, and those last few words, even more than the previous open apologies, left him speechless.

Not many people, because of his complicated nature of a being who went on living for four millennia keeping every single memory of that incredibly long past, had paused to look under the veil he always wore… Shibuya was the only other one. And maybe they were the words Wolfram had used, or the tone of his voice, that made the trick.

Maybe just the fact that it was him…

He really didn’t know, but somehow he had lost his breath and, together with it, his words.

“So? Now that we finished eating, what did you want to show me?”, the blond asked him at last, breaking the heavy silence that had fallen as a cape upon them.

_…yeah… what indeed…_

He had been the first one who had mentioned it, and he had been the one who had asked him to stay in the first place, but he was feeling too unsettled to play all his cards at once and risk to waste eleven years of dreams and desires and hopes when he couldn’t manage to control even his own emotions, let alone Wolfram’s ones the moment he would have confessed his feelings to him.

And then, there still was Shibuya… they were engaged and even if things weren’t going well between them, that was the way it was…

There was a reason, after all, if he had disregarded his own selfish promise once he had fulfilled the requirements he had set in the start _for two whole years_!

“Please, don’t get angry at me for my sudden decision, my lord”, Ken started while abruptly rising from his seat, “but you will have to wait for another occasion to see it, because I definitely won’t show that to you today.”, he stated, his voice as unfaltering as he could manage.

Wolfram stood up in reflex at his sudden movement, but his expression showed all his disorientation for that last assertion of his.

“You did nor said anything wrong, my lord”, Ken replied to that confused look as if the question was pronounced out loud, “so please: just read it as an old man’s whim and don’t ruminate on it for longer than necessary. It’s not a matter worth any loss of your precious time.”

_Actually, it was. But still not now._

“Are you doing it on purpose?”, the blond asked him, suspicious, and he could only shook his head in front of those not-so-implicit accusations.

“No. Not this time. As I told you earlier, I almost never plan anything in advance, and this one is just one of those times.”

Ken waited for an angry retort from the blond, but to his utter surprise that never came and, instead, in an unsettling tone Wolfram, in his candor, only asked: “Will you ever show that to me?”

In front of such an abrupt and direct question, he could do nothing else but snort, his eyes suddenly old and sad, his cowardice coming back.

“…maybe”, he lied forcing himself to a wide smile that yet didn’t reach his eyes, and the blond might have sensed that he wasn’t sincere because he glared at him in response and even grabbed both his hands in his, their gazes locked together.

“I’ll come back in a week”, Wolfram declared then, “and I want you to show me whatever it is you convinced me to stay for today.”

“So greedy, my lord!”, he retorted while gently but firmly freeing himself from the other’s grip and attempting to control his own body that started to react to the sudden contact now that his self-control was crumbling. “It doesn’t suit your status at all! What would your uncle say if he heard you now?”, he replied, his tone and face a perfected-over-the-millennia mirror of a mocking indifference.

_Yes, it was in moments like these that he was glad that he had lived so long to know how to conceal his emotions._

“But that’s how I am: I don’t like secrets, and I hate that expression on your face.”, Wolfram added salt to the open wounds, putting a huge strain on his self-control and daring him to resist.

_But really, he hadn’t lived so long for nothing!_

And so he snorted again – a scoff to himself, in truth, and to his own incapability to have the upper hand over such a young and impulsive creature as the blond in front of him.

But, despite that, he didn’t want to close that door shut… he could leave it open a crack!

“I’ll think about it”, he conceded at last, “but I won’t assure you that your wish will be granted.”

He had to sustain Wolfram’s studying gaze for a long moment before receiving a reply, and he had to admit that what came out of the blond’s lips was more than he could ever hope in the best of his dreams.

“Then I will come every week during my free day starting from next week – that means that you’ll see me again here in nine days from now – until you’ll show me what I want to see.”

_Oh the flames into those beautiful eyes! How long was it since the last time he had witnessed such a passion inside them?_

“…then we will see who will get tired sooner…”, he challenged him now, openly at last.

He really couldn’t help it, this time!

“I can be very persistent when I want to”, Wolfram retorted then and, hinting a bow at him, he left with that promise without waiting for him to show him outside.

“…please, be it…”, he murmured once the door of his parlor was closed again and Lord von Bielefeld already far away.


	5. Melancholy of the Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I totally guessed for the names of the Sage and Shinou and chose - especially for Shinou - the one I found the most fitting for this story... hope you won't mind ;)  
> ps: maybe I should have said that already in the other story, but even if I'm sure that all of you know it, I'm gonna repeat it here: the Daikenja is one of (it seems many) Shinou's half-brothers and he's younger than him. It's canon, and there's a hint in the manga and I suppose that it's thoroughly treated in the novels... I'm not really sure that the sage knows in the canon story, but here he knows ;)  
> Ok, that's all: let's continue! :D

“…you really lack in courage, sometimes, my sage.”, a voice at his back made him jerk in surprise, but knowing Shinou he would have had to wait for him to show up any moment after that his blond flame had left.

“Shut up, you.”, he sighed exasperated and didn’t turn to watch at him, his eyes still on the closed door.

He knew that he was right, but there was so much at stake, damn!

Maybe he was also slightly angry at himself…

“It’s not a bad development, by the way!”, Shinou cheered him up then and reached him only to be able to rest his head over his shoulder like he always did in the past to comfort him when something bad happened, to find comfort in him… or just when they were alone.

They remained like that in silence, enjoying that calm and tasting that bittersweet taste of an old, soothing feeling that could be no more the same as it had been once, a very, very long time ago.

“Wolfram…”, Ken cooed softly and heaved a sigh while a sad smile curved up his lips ever so slightly, but he didn’t turn towards him.

 “I liked it better when I was the only man that you called by that name, Siegfried.”

“That’s no more my name, silly. It passed four thousand years: I changed, and I changed a lot.”

“…more than that, it seems to me that you’re attempting to deny that past. To totally erase the memories that we still share of that time.”

“We are just shadows of the past. You can’t fit in, as I can’t either if I stick to that past memory of a man that doesn’t exist anymore… here in this world they venerate me like they do with you. We are like gods to them, and that’s why I too live here with you at the temple: they would never accept me to stay at the castle, because a god can’t live among men…”, he slowly inhaled and ruefully exhaled, but before Shinou could say anything he continued. “There are only two persons who act around me like I’m a person too, and you know who they are. For them, before being the sage, I’m Murata Ken. For Shibuya I’m a friend like everybody else, and for your descendant I’m a perverted old man that might be your Great Sage, your late right-hand man, but at the same time he never showed me the respect that everybody else found it was due to me… he had always said everything that crossed his mind, complained when he didn’t agree with me or when he found me annoying… in that, maybe, I see a little bit of you…”

He sighed again.

“The two of you are very different in character most of the time, but maybe he took after you just for this one thing.”, Murata declared with a small smile.

“It might be the influence of the name…”, Shinou suggested. “You know how important a name is, after all.” Then he made a pause and added: “That’s why I hate to call you Ken… because it makes your changes too evident.”

“But you can’t deny the actual differences between us: in four thousand years”, Ken started to explain, “you remained inside the temple as a spirit, venerated as a deity, out of time and space and immutable, where I lived in the real world, life after life until now, being born and dying so many times that I lost count, experimenting every kind of good and bad things, enjoying my time and suffering such as much. And that started with wearing me out. Then, I don’t really know when it happened, I must have died along the way and another me took place, a very different kind of person, and Murata Ken is the actual result of that process. So, Wolfram… brother, I’m no more the man I was as much as I’m no longer your brother, because there’s nothing in this body of the late Siegfried Olm if not a memory of a short time living a life under that name. I’m no one, yet I exist… as you do too, in a way…”

A long silence fell after those harsh, bitter and sad words, and this time Shinou sighed heavily; then he moved in front of him and gently posed a hand on Ken’s cheek, and it left him a strange feeling that intangible yet in a way solid hand against his skin.

They watched at each other in the eyes for an eternal moment until the First King’s lips lightly brushed over the sage’s ones, leaving a cold sensation at the immaterial touch of that manifestation of the other’s maryoku.

But Ken didn’t retract and only closed his eyes, accepting in kind that offer of soothing his pain away.

“I wish I could go back to that time and forbid you from accepting this burden on yourself…”, Shinou whispered at last against his soft lips and the sage heaved the umpteenth sigh and exasperatedly shook his head, slowly.

“For you I would do this a million times again, even if it might have been useless, after all… It’s hard, but I don’t regret that choice I made, my late love. And by now I got used to this kind of living, and I even started to appreciate all little things that this long life offers to me.”, he kindly smiled back at the other’s rueful face and this time _he_ kissed him tenderly.

“And that’s why, even if now I’m back here in Shin Makoku, where almost no one sees me as just a normal person, as a living creature like everybody else, I want to try and _live_.”, he declared and, despite his sad eyes, Shinou smiled too.

“I wish you luck, my dearest.”

“Thank you.”, he replied, and after these words the First King only nodded once in response and vanished, leaving him alone in his parlor again.


	6. Sharing Interests

Nine days passed far too slowly for Murata’s tastes so, made exception for a couple of hours in the morning and another couple in the evening after sunset that he passed taking care of his flowers in what had become his private garden, courtesy of Ulrike, he passed almost all the rest of his time in his quarters reading book after book, and his parlor, and even his bedroom, had become a real mess.

Even that morning, expecting Wolfram to come no sooner than the late afternoon, he decided to occupy his time and his head reading. He had in mind to tidy up a little and get rid of the tomes before his guest’s arrival, but given that he was sure that there was still time, he postponed like he used to do every time that he could.

So, when a little bit before lunch Ulrike knocked at his door to announce Lord von Bielefeld’s arrival, the surprise almost showed on his face.

“Thank you, Ulrike. I’m coming.”, he briefly replied and kindly smiled at her in response and when his door closed again he smacked his hands over his face, trying to cover his embarrassment and anticipation with that gesture.

“…shit, I should have tidied earlier…”, he cursed at his past him of that morning who decided to wait until the last moment to do it. Then, once he calmed himself enough to be presentable and to be able to act natural, he left his chambers and headed towards the Waterfall Room where his guest was waiting for him.

-&-

“Oh, Gods! You really like reading!”, Wolfram exclaimed once he entered the sage’s parlor and found that his words about his quarters conditions weren’t an overstatement, and Ken scoffed at the surprise in his voice and at the comment.

… _so innocent_ …

“Your scolding was kinder than I expected it to be, my lord. I almost imagined you yelling at me for my laziness and dishevelment…”, he replied with an amused and provoking smirk curving up his lips.

Wolfram slightly blushed at that, but he recovered pretty soon.

“Maybe I should have! It’s really unbefitting for the Great Sage of Shin Makoku to be such a slob, after all. Thanks Shinou that no one saw that other than me!”

…then he might have realized what he just said and how he said it because this time he turned bright red in the face up to the tip of his ears. “…I didn’t mean it the way it sounded… I mean…”

“No reason to get flustered over it”, Ken played the indifferent role but he was flushing inside even if it didn’t show on his face. “After all that’s true. Other than you, only Ulrike and Shibuya know how much of a slacker I am, and talking about our Maoh, he didn’t come to see me here in the last three years or so… and with time I only got worse, so he might not know of my actual level of sloppiness!”, he joked, minimizing, but it didn’t help to dissipate the other’s embarrassment.

“By the way”, he tried again then, “Among this mountain of piled books and tomes, the other day I found one book that I’m sure you would enjoy reading.”, he declared and started to look around to see if he saw it, “Let me find it and I’ll lend it to you.”

So he started searching and looked for it everywhere in his parlor and in his bedroom without finding it, all under the growingly questioning look on his fine guest’s face; that until he remembered where he had put it once he finished it.

So he raised the curtains over the mattress, bended over to look under his bed and then just picked out a thick tome from under there.

“You must be kidding… _under your bed_?!”, Wolfram exclaimed, now totally shocked by the other’s negligence towards himself and his things… or better, towards things belonging to the temple.

“I put it there so not to get rid of it before showing it to you”, he explained with an amused smile in reply to Wolfram’s scandalized face the more he went on with his justifications. “But now that we’re at it, here”, he said, and then he handed out to him a thick book of short stories, everyone linked to the others in some way, a collection of one of his Shin Makoku’s favorite authors who lived under the eleventh Maoh. “I’m sure you’ll like it, knowing your tastes.”

“How do you know my tastes?”, Wolfram asked then, appalled, but when he read the title he turned bright red in the face again.

“Now seven years ago you asked me to translate for you _One Thousand and One Nights_ and you extolled it a lot while you were still reading it and for a while after you finished it, if you remember well…”

His eyes still open wide and his cheeks burning, then, Wolfram glanced away and, going back to the previous topic and the book in the sage's hands, he started, embarrassed to no end: "…actually…… that one in your hands...", he made another pause, "...is my favorite book...”, he confessed at last, not knowing where to look, and this time Ken slightly flushed too in spite of his always impeccable self-control.

An embarrassed silence followed, and then Wolfram glanced at him, his cheeks still slightly pink.

“…did you like it?”, he asked in a peculiarly timid voice and Ken couldn’t refrain from lightly sneering at such a shy Lord von Bielefeld.

“Yes. I read all his other works before this one because I heard that it was his masterpiece and I wanted to top it off with that.”, he explained. “And actually, I guess that I agree with the voices about it: it’s an extremely fine work”, he declared and then added in a neutral and controlled tone: “And I must affirm that he’s one of my five favorite writers of all time and of both worlds so far. So yes, I liked it.”

At his words, Wolfram’s eyes brightened.

“ _Really_!!”, he almost shouted, excited. “For two years I tried to get Yuuri to read it and, when he did, he didn’t even reach page _thirty_ that he abandoned it and told me that he didn’t like to read such girlish books! _Girlish!!_ I tried to explain to him that there was adventure and suspense too, but he only saw the romance…”, the blond complained and sighed resigned, suddenly forgetting all about his previous fluster.

“Yeah, I know.”, the sage replied. “I had to force him to read some of my favorite manga in the past, hoping that, at least because they were all drawn, he could appreciate them, but I failed. So I just stopped to try.”

“You mean those pictured storybooks?”, the blond bended his head on the side in confusion at the name. He remembered having heard it before, but it was so long since then that he wanted to be sure.

“Yeah, I guess you can call them that, after all.”, Murata confirmed, and Wolfram lightly sighed.

“I remember seeing them in our room a few years ago… they were so beautiful to watch, but I hated not to be able to read what happened. Well, actually I’m more into a more experimental kind of art, but I can appreciate talent when I see it.”

“Well, translating them for you might not be that easy, but, even if that might be a little awkward, maybe next time I can try to read them to you…”, he suggested, and the blond flushed. “Or I can just teach you Japanese, even if it might take longer and more efforts than it is worth…”

Wolfram got even more flustered at the last offer, so Ken decided to just change topic entirely.

“So: would you help me tidy up a little, or would you rather eat in one of the courtyards since here it became a little crowded with all these books around and help me later? After all it’s a really nice day and it’s time for lunch already. I’ll let you choose, my lord.”, the sage offered, and abruptly the determination inflamed Wolfram’s eyes again.

“Then, since we have to absolutely fight that laziness of yours, we will tidy up now and we will eat later… and then you will keep your word about those chocolates you mentioned earlier…”, he smirked mischievously, and Ken amusedly snorted at him in response.

“At your command, my lord: and don’t you fear. I might be an incurable lazybones sometimes, but I’m also a man of my word, after all! You’ll have all the chocolates your heart desires, I promise.”


	7. Consolation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait... it's my thesis fault this time! ;_;  
> But here I am! I hope you'll enjoy this new chapter too :D

“…by the way”, Wolfram concluded his long monologue about the many reasons why he loved _Eternal Flame_ while picking up the twelfth chocolate candy from the box on the small table right in front of him, “I still find incredible that you were able to spot my favorite book amongst all!”, he just finished to say when he suddenly stopped and studied the sage, abruptly dubious. “…because it was by pure chance, wasn’t it? …you didn’t set everything up just to impress me or make fun of me, did you?”

Murata burst out laughing in front of the sudden change in his guest’s expression and tone after his half an hour go about that book and the author’s other works.

“I swear: it was by chance, my lord. And actually, knowing your tastes a little bit”, this time he leavened the same comment that he had already done earlier, “it was indeed naïf of me to assume that you didn’t read it already.”, he confessed when he stopped laughing still with an amused smile drawn on his face.

Wolfram seemed to ponder on the sincerity of his reply before deciding that his words might be convincing enough for him and, when he finally did, the blond relaxed again in his long chair and smiled back at him.

“Then I’m glad”, the demon replied and, after studying the box of sweets resting in front of him for his only pleasure, he took the thirteenth candy out of them and savored it in a blissful sigh, even closing his eyes this time in order to enjoy the taste better. “Mmmh, they are _so_ _good_!” and while saying it he leaned forward and made to take another that, in a chuckle to cover his frustration, Ken stopped him this time.

“My lord! Please, save some! I don’t know when I’ll be able to go back to Earth, after all. If you finish them all today, what am I supposed to offer you next week?”, he exclaimed and playfully winked at his guest, but at his words, that were nothing but an innocent joke, Wolfram clouded over all of a sudden and he, on the other hand, froze alarmed by the abrupt change.

_Did he exaggerate, by any chance? But if it was the case… why now and not when he had been wittier than this?_

“What is it? Am I winning already?”, he deliberately replied to the blond’s unexpected reaction, a perfected over the years sarcastic grin curving up his lips and hiding all his fears behind it.

“I’m leaving for one month’s patrol tomorrow morning with some of my men.”, Wolfram proclaimed in a neutral tone then and Ken stiffened.

_What was that? Why didn’t he know? Lord von Voltaire could annoy him with fruitless chats about stuff that everybody but him seemed able to comprehend that he couldn’t solve, but he didn’t bother tell him about riots at the border?! That was unacceptable!_

“Any reports of rioting somewhere?”, he queried then, more angry than alarmed if he had to be totally true to himself, but, when he asked that, Wolfram lowered his gaze before replying.

“Nothing of the sort. No need to get alarmed…”, he stated only, his tone off, so much so that he seemed another person entirely from the one he had been until just a moment before when he was chatting about his tastes and interests and he was eating chocolates showing him a face that Ken would have rather elicited in him with some other ‘art’ – definitely a more _intimate_ one…

_But that wasn’t the time for such impure thoughts…_

So he just focused again on the more urgent matter and started to study him, his black eyes prying into his crush’s soul in search for an answer.

Then he recognized the signs, and the concern, together with a growing anger, started to raise inside him, becoming more difficult to conceal every passing second.

“What happened at the castle while I wasn’t there that made you decide to leave for so long?”, he inquired in a murderous hiss and the blond in front of him, under his prying gaze, only swallowed hard and, for a few moments, he remained silent, so clearly watching at him while desperately searching for something to say without sounding pathetic.

“Nothing.”, he only said in the end, and, in front of such an obvious lie, Ken’s black eyes hardened even more and it was then, after throwing a quick glance at the box of chocolates on the small table that, for some reason, Wolfram covered up his face with both his hands and burst into tears and sobs under his disconcerted eyes.

_What the hell happened these last few days?!_

Really, he would have liked to go to the castle and give a punch in the face to whoever brought this beautiful creature in front of his eyes to such a breakdown!

Then, instinctively, Ken rose from his seat, reached Wolfram on the other side of the tea table and hugged him against his chest like he had done so many times in the past with his so many children that he happened to have along the way and raise, even if for just a short while in comparison with the length of his maddening long life.

And while Wolfram slowly calmed down under his soothing cares, he swore to himself that he would have gotten to the bottom of all this.

At all costs, and someone would have paid for that.

It was a promise.


	8. Almost surrendering to his impulses

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay in this last chapter's release...  
> My thesis is draining my energy, and I'm learning Norwegian and I'm pretty much into it right now, so when I have a little time, instead of sleeping, I study it... and I play games XD  
> Geez... 24 hours are not enough!! XD
> 
> Sorry for that.... but enjoy the chapter! ;)

In his arms Ken felt Wolfram calm down and, with him, his own rage.

He continued to caress his head, gently and protectively, the softness of those thin shining hair working as a stress-reliever under his hands, through his fingers.

He couldn’t control a long sigh from coming out of his mouth, but he luckily stopped just in time before kissing those bright hair of his, because he knew himself and his own frustrated desire enough to be sure that, if he had ever kissed him, even if just over his head, he would have never been able to stop himself after that.

“I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to---”, Wolfram suddenly interrupted his dangerous train of thoughts and brought him back to the reality of their respective positions.

“You’re not the one who needs to be sorry here, Wolfram.”, he cut him off, still slightly out of it, and then he realized his mistake and panicked for an instant “…I mean Lord von Bielefeld”, he quickly corrected himself then, but it was too late: the damage was done already…

Despite that the man in front of him, after the evident surprise when being called so familiarly by him who had never – ever – used just his name before to address him or even to talk about him, neither with Yuuri, only lowered his gaze and, still red in embarrassment, to his mistake he just replied: “Wolfram is ok… I don’t mind…”

Feeling peculiarly uneasy, Ken took a step back from him.

“…what I meant”, he started more to cut the heavy air than anything else, trying to justify his previous mistake with what he was better at: rhetoric, “is that after so long it’s only natural if you reached your breaking point. Better yet: you had shown to be really persistent, so no one should blame you of your behavior now. I’d like to see anybody else at your place. I’m sure that they won’t last a week!”

But despite his attempt to make the situation better, Wolfram turned suddenly bright red instead, even more than when he had tried to suggest for him to read his favorite book.

Then, after a long, odd silence, totally out of the blue Wolfram asked him, his voice a broken whisper:

“Why, sage?”

But the question was too generic even for someone like him this time, so he made the only thing he could at the moment: he watched at him and waited for him to explain himself. And when he did, his eyes widened in astonishment.

“Why are you consoling me?”, the blond queried, his voice broken again, sounding desperate and showing him how alone he really was. “You don’t even know what happened…”, he went on then, more frantic the more the words left his mouth and filled the silence. “Why aren’t you blaming me like everybody else? Why aren’t you mocking me like you always did in the past? Don’t I deserve it? After all I’m the laughing stock of the entire castle by now: you can laugh at Lord Virgin Brat’s expense like they like to call me now, after all, together with everybody else…”

…

_For all the gods’ sake: did he really say ‘virgin’? Did Shibuya really never ever tried to touch him, even just to try, to give him a chance, in twelve whole years of sharing the same bed at night?_

Well, he knew Yuuri’s point of view, but damn! Not even giving him a single chance to prove him wrong, to make him understand that maybe having sex with a man wasn’t as impossible as he believed it to be!

…

But it wasn’t the moment for these kind of thoughts.

Definitely.

So he forced himself to calm down again.

“You only deserve consolation, Wolfram”, he stated with cold self control, but the next words that left his mouth made him overheat again, at least a bit: “and whoever affirms the contrary deserves to live in pain the rest of their lives.”

He didn’t even have the time to realize his own last statement that he heard Wolfram scoff at him instead.

“Incredible!”, the blond exclaimed, his tone and behavior suddenly cynical, “Who would have thought that the Great Sage – the Maoh’s best friend – was instead my only other supporter together with my uncle? But don’t you fear, Your Excellency: your secret is safe with me!”, he spouted harshly but then, after a pause, his expression clouded again and his tone became bitter “After all, who would ever listen to me?”

 

That was too much.

Too much to bear for one single day.

Wolfram deserved better.

He deserved to understand what a precious jewel he was!

For a moment he stopped thinking and his right arm moved on its own; his hand opening and harden under his own astonishment, like in a trance… as if it was someone else’s arm and hand… someone else’s life entirely.

 

…

 

But he bounced back together just in time, mere fractions of second before it was too late.

 

But again, even if the slap never happened, even if he had refrained in time, the damage was made again, and this one was a really, really big one.

 

“…stop it”, he said instead, trying to cut the silence in a last, desperate attempt to distract the other from what he almost did and obviously and extraordinarily failing. “Moping on yourself does not suit you.”, he declared, his voice hoarse.

Then the silence fell again and they watched at each other for an eternal moment when, founding that situation totally out of control with the tension exponentially rising every second passed in silence at staring at each other with nothing to say to defuse the heavy atmosphere, Ken finally asked with a forced smile while already approaching the door: “What about some tea?”

And Wolfram, in reply, only nodded at him. In a kind of a desperate way.

But he totally shared that feeling this time…

The second later, Ken was already out of there, the door safely closed behind his back to hide what now was clearly visible on his face: his emotions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... geez how I love Murata! He's my favorite character ever! Not just of Kyo Kara Maoh!  
>  *fangirling like if there were no tomorrow*


	9. Watching him run

Ken stayed there, his eyes closed and his back against the wall right next to the door, for like an eternity.

His breath was short and it seemed that no one of his usual methods to regain his composure wanted to work this time.

A maiden passed by that moment and, seeing him flat against the wall with a hand clenched on the robes over his heart, she tried to approach him to offer him some help, but Murata threw her such an icy, murderous glance that she retracted on the spot and, with a deep, apologetic bow at him, she disappeared from his view so quick that it seemed that she’d never been there for a start.

Luckily for him, the sudden distraction worked where everything else had already failed.

He supposed that he would have better apologized later to the poor woman whose only fault had been that she happened to be in the wrong place the wrong moment… but he didn’t really watched at her…

“Oh well”, he muttered to himself then, resigned. “I’m the Mighty Shin Makoku’s Great Sage: I already smile for everybody all the time. If for once I’m a bit rude to someone it’s not such a big deal, isn’t it? …I’m a person too, and I’m as flawed as everybody else… and maybe even more than them, even if all of you don’t seem to acknowledge this simple fact…”

He loudly sighed.

“I guess that if I show back without tea it might be even more awkward…”, he said to himself while finally moving from against the wall that had supported him until then, when suddenly the door of his room brusquely opened and then slammed closed again, Wolfram coming out of his rooms and so eager to leave that he didn’t even notice his presence at less than a couple of meters from where he was.

He knew by the way he had opened the door and by his quick stride that the blond wasn’t going to turn back and notice him, but he watched him go until he turned the corner in hope that he just did that regardless.

Then, when it didn’t happen, he closed his eyes again and, with a sigh, he found the handle of his own quarters with no need to look at it.

Once inside, furious with himself, he slammed the door with all his strength and a loud, frustrated groan.

“ _Shit_!”, he cursed with clenched teeth.   

Then he noticed the piece of paper written over the pile of blank ones on his desk.

Reluctantly he reached the table and took the note in his shamefully shaking hand.

 

“ ‘I am sorry’, eh?”, he commented with a snort and then he burst out laughing and wasn’t able to stop for the next several minutes.

And he laughed so hard that tears formed at the corner of his eyes… because he would have never acknowledged them for anything but the laughter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, this was such a short chapter... very short.  
> And it's angsty... but you already know that it's just a phase... so bear with it just a little longer! ;)
> 
> By the way, next chapter has all the potential to be a long one: let's see how long it'll become together!  
> A hint: Yozak will be in it! ;)
> 
> See you! ;)


	10. To the castle

Ken patiently waited a week – an entire, long, _eternal_ week – before finally going to the castle to collect detailed information about what had really happened to Lord von Bielefeld in the nine days between his first and his second visit to the temple.

Because despite the failure of their second encounter, he _needed_ to know.

And he knew whom to ask to.

In truth, thinking back at his last serious conversation with Shinou, he hadn’t been totally fair, because actually there was one man with whom, from the start, he had really felt at ease and that he considered a friend far more than he considered Yuuri to be that… and he was the one whom he really aimed to meet today!

So he left early that morning and, when he arrived, the firsts he noticed were Yuuri and sir Weller in the courtyard for their sword training.

He stopped to watch at them from afar so not to disturb them until the end of their duel and, after twelve years, actually, he had to admit that his friend had finally got better at it: he still was a little stiff sometimes, but in general he seemed to have understood that he had a sword in his hands and not a bat, which actually was the biggest improvement until then.

Then his eyes fell on Shibuya’s teacher and rested there for a while, totally captured by the swiftness and the perfection of his every movement. He had never been particularly fond of the man, but gods if he was good! Not a single muscle moving more than necessary, every movement optimized at the maximum level: an efficient, lethal war machine.

Totally enraptured by Conrad’s precise perfection, he didn’t notice the man who had joined him there.

“Splendid, isn’t he?”, the well-known voice commented and he snorted, unable to remove his eyes from the brunet’s movements.

“I can’t object, but still I can’t understand what you see in him. You could be able to have any man or woman, human or mazoku, in this world and on Earth, and still you are here, struggling for a man who lives trapped in the past, searching for a dead in someone who only wants to live his own life and be himself and not someone else’s shadow.”

Harsh words, but nothing the redhead next to him wasn’t used to when talking about his Captain.

“I’m not always struggling, you know?”, Yozak retorted. “Sometimes we share a bed… and sometimes I share a bed with others…”, he hinted with a half grin and a wink at him who only sighed in resignation.

“But well: who am I to tell you how to live your life, my friend? After all I guess I’m no better than you…”, he confessed with a plastered smile on his face.

So fake…

But Yozak, surely thinking that he was talking about the First King, let the topic die.

“It seems that we are collecting an audience, Your Majesty”, they heard Weller state to the Maoh once they stopped after Yuuri lost his grip over his sword… and to his ‘Your Majesty’ the usual reply followed...

“How many times must I tell you that it’s Yuuri, Conrad?!”

_Incredible like in twelve years neither of them had gotten tired of that farce!_

Actually, that faked reverence coming from sir Weller was probably what really made him despise the man…

But he soon got distracted from his train of thought.

“Murata!!”, Yuuri exclaimed collecting his sword again from the ground and putting it back in its sheath, and the second later he was running towards them. “What are you doing here at the castle? How are you? It’s so long since the last time I saw you here!”

Really… twelve fucking years of being friends and he still called him by his surname! But if he went on with that, he wouldn’t have been the first one to try to change it.

So he swallowed a sigh and broadly smiled at him instead.

“Shibuya! How nice to see you too. Actually, it’s not so long since the last time I came, but you were always busy and I was never able to see you before needing to go back to the temple. But today I got annoyed and I thought to come and say hello.”, he explained.

A lie, obviously, but today only _one_ person would have known the truth behind his visit there, and given the little crowd around them, he could wait. Because, actually, the only rush he had was the one elicited by his own curiosity, and after four thousand years he knew how to control it.

Then the Maoh turned towards his teacher, silently asking for his permission to stop the training and pass a little time with his friend.

And obviously the man nodded at his pupil.

“Then see you at lunch.”, Murata stepped in, “I’ll kidnap Shibuya for a while. Please, sir Weller: tell Lord von Christ that the Great Sage had to talk with the Maoh about some important matter concerning the kingdom… or whatever. Please, find a plausible excuse for his absence to his morning lesson!”, he cheerfully required and he mischievously smiled at the now slightly troubled man before leaving.

So Conrad sighed like all the other times he had been cornered by the sage in a similar situation but, like every other time, he nodded at him.

“And Yozak: are you free this afternoon for the beers I owe you, you lucky devil?”

It was their code, and Weller might know that or at least imagine it from his dubious gaze he threw at the both of them, but he really didn’t care about what he might or might not think!

“Another bet? When will you stop?!”, Yuuri intervened, his tone clearly disappointed. “You know that betting is addictive!”

“Too late, my friend… and I’m too old to change my habits now!”, he joked.

“You speak like an old man, Murata! Please, stop it!”

“Can’t help it!” he giggled back at the other’s preachment. “So, Yozak? Are you free?”

“Actually I have an errand for Lord von Voltaire this afternoon, but it’s in the city, so you can accompany me there and then wait for me something like half an hour or so at the pub… how does it sound?”

“Well: today I decided that it’ll be a free day for me, so it’s not a problem. But you’ll pay for the beers I’ll be drinking while I wait for you. Deal?”

Yozak scoffed.

“Deal. Then see you at two by the gates with your horse, ready to leave.”

That said, the group split up and he left with Yuuri, going to hide where Lord von Christ (or Lord von Voltaire) wouldn’t have been able to find the Maoh until lunch time: his old rooms – that same room where he had seen Wolfram stand two weeks and a half previous.

 

“Soooo…”, Ken started and extracted a card deck from his pocket with a conspiratorial grin while sitting on a chair at the table in the corner next to the window. “How about a game while you entertain me with some news of life in the castle? It’s sooo boring at the temple where all that happens are Shinou’s pranks!”

Not a lie, actually…

But Yuuri hesitated and his eyes glued on the cards he was serving on the table they had always used to play cards in the past years (even if it was almost one year and a half that they didn’t use that room together).

“So? How’s life with your problematic fiancé? Still arguing a lot?”, he dropped there just to study Yuuri’s reaction.

And Yuuri clouded over even more.

_So predictable._

“Wolfram left a few days ago and he’ll be away for a month…”, he replied vaguely.

And well: at least this level of haziness was unexpected coming from him, knowing Yuuri’s nature.

And that only raised his curiosity.

Exponentially.

“Woah?! Really? I didn’t know!”, he lied. “What for?”, he pried then, feigning ignorance.

And Yuuri hesitated again.

“…some patrol at Bielefeld. His uncle asked him to join him there, it seems. I guess he’ll want to try to convince him to take over his role as head of the Bielefeld house.”

Ken stared at him intently for a while in silence and he noticed his friend turning paler the more his studying gaze rested on him.

“…you’re getting definitely better at lying, but you’re four thousand years too young to be able to fool me. Next time just tell me that you don’t feel like talking about it, ok?”, he replied feigning a friendly tone and an understanding smile, totally in contrast with the words that followed. “I don’t like it when people try to lie to me: I’m not stupid.”

“I didn’t want to offend you”, Yuuri apologized. “…it’s just that it’s getting harder and harder for the both of us… and some circumstances of the last couple of weeks made him decide to leave for a while. I really hope that staying away will help him stabilize a bit and recover.”, Yuuri ruefully confessed then, and Ken heaved a tired sigh.

“I won’t force you, but you know that you can talk to me, don’t you?”, he proclaimed. “We’re friends after all, and I’m here to support you. I hope that you’ll remember that.”

Slightly hypocritical coming from him who could not force him to talk just because he was planning to ask Yozak about what happened later, but well: it wasn’t a complete lie, actually. One of the reasons which had convinced him to stay in Shin Makoku instead of leaving his original world forever and live on Earth, where everything was easier for him, had been to be able to help Yuuri learn how to rule a country and be there to morally support him.

The other main reason was Wolfram.

Because he was a bit of a masochist in truth… and after having met him, he knew that, even if he had decided to go back to Earth and never come back, and if there he had just continued his life as Murata Ken, finding a woman or a man to form a family with, his mind and heart would have been with that blond all the time. And he would have regretted for the rest of his eternal life not to see him ever again… not to dream for a chance for himself with him in the future.

Even if now, after that single moment of distraction over his own self-control, that dream seemed nothing more than an impossible dream to wish for, even worse than it was at start, because he had tasted the sweetness of the other’s attention turned at him, of an understanding… of a link… and he had wasted all his efforts in one single, crucial intant.

…but again: it wasn’t the moment for thinking at something like that!

“…thank you, Murata. I’ll remember that. I promise.”, Yuuri replied with a sad smile, awakening him from his wandering thoughts.

“Then now let’s just think at something else and enjoy our card-match! What’ll we bet?”, he smirked at him, knowing exactly what his last question would have brought on him.

“Just stop it, Murata! We won’t bet anything at all! How many times do I have to repeat myself with you already?!”

And then everything was back to normal between them and they enjoyed their morning together until lunchtime.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the end I split the chapter in half because I got tired, so see you next chapter for more drinking, chatting and for more Yozak-Sage interaction! ;)


	11. Finally what he wanted to know, but…

“You’re early, Your Eminence! Didn’t see that coming at all!”, Yozak joked when, ten minutes before the set up time for their meeting by the gate, the Sage was already there, ready and talking to a guard to kill time while waiting for him despite his being famous for being late all the time.

“Can’t wait to see how many beers I’ll be able to drink before you join me too since you’ll be the one who’ll pay for them!”, Ken retorted with a mischievous grin and a wink at the guard next to him, who laughed back and patted Yozak on the shoulder.

“Have mercy of my wallet! I’m not that rich, you know?”, the redhead complained and like that they left, friendly waving at the man on watch by the gate.

Then, once they got far enough from prying ears, Yozak turned serious again and watched at the double black mounting at his right.

“So? What is this all about?”, Yozak asked, but Ken’s eyes pierced through him, unfathomable despite the glacial rage inexplicably detectable in that gaze.

“I don’t want distractions, so we’ll talk about it once you’ll have dealt with whatever you have to do for Lord von Voltaire.”, he stated in a tone that brooked no argument and then, switching to a broad, malicious smile, he totally changed topic. “In the meanwhile”, he continued, “why don’t you tell me something funny, like, for example, how you convinced sir Weller to be mounted by you the last time?”

Yozak scoffed and then burst in a resigned chortle.

“You really dislike the man, don’t you, Your Eminence?”

But, at the sobriquet, Ken reined in and stopped his mare while _glaring_ at the half-mazoku with murderous eyes.

“Do you really want to copy that slapstick between Shibuya and your crush with _me_?”, he spouted harshly and Yozak, not at all used to such venom in the sage’s always friendly tone in almost every occasion – even the most inappropriate ones – turned pale for a moment before recovering from the surprise.

So he tried to do what he was better at: he tried to laugh it over.

“I’m sorry, Ken.”, he started in a light tone more than in an apologetic one, in fact. “It’s just that it has passed quite some time since the last time it was just the two of us, far from prying ears who might misunderstand such an intimacy between us.”, then he looked at him with a faked lascivious glance before adding a malicious: “You stopped asking me out in the last few months and I fell out of habit! Don’t get angry at your poor friend here! Even the best of us stumble sometimes, after all!”

Then Yozak winked at him and he calmed down. Or better: he forced himself to do so.

So, in the end, he smiled back at the spy.

“That means that just for this once I’ll turn a blind eye…”, he conceded at last. “By the way”, he resumed the previous topic and decided to answer the redhead’s question despite everything, “yes, I do. Terribly”, he declared, totally unashamed of that. “And I must admit that it’s rare for me to _actively_ dislike someone to such an extent, so it’s quite an extraordinary case!”.

Then he made a brief pause and, suddenly lost in his own thoughts, he added, more to himself, this time, than to him: “He’s such an unhealthy person…”

 _Almost as much as_ he _was…_

And actually, every time he looked at Sir Weller, he felt like looking at himself in the mirror: a totally _disgusting_ feeling!

That reminded him of _The Picture of Dorian Gray_ and he grimaced for a moment before smiling back at Yozak, who just watched at him in silence, not daring opening his mouth despite his almost uncontrollable tendency of butting in everything that could pick his interest or just arouse his inner curiosity...

Another one of the many privileges that his muscly friend granted him, actually, and which he was really grateful of!

Then, and it was something even more peculiar than his lack of prying, Yozak lowered his gaze and heaved a very long and deep sigh.

“I understand your point, but I can’t control my heart.”, the spy replied in earnest, a bitter and resigned tone coloring his voice. “But that’s actually the main reason why I still keep my distance from him most of the time instead of actively pursuing his love.”, he explained.

To these words, at last, Ken stopped his horse again. Then, when Yozak did the same, he finally spoke.

“…I’m sorry, Yozak. I really shouldn’t pry there, but I esteem you too much to wanting to see you with such an unworthy man at your side! …even if I’m probably the last one who should talk…”, he repeated the same statement of that morning, but this time Yozak didn’t let pass that comment so easily again.

“Do you still love the First King?”, the redhead abruptly asked him and for a moment Ken stared at him appalled for such an unforeseen and direct question.

 _No one_ had ever dared ask him about that in his face – not even Ulrike! But he was as sure as death that more than one would have died to know the answer to that specific question.

He blinked twice and then he impishly smiled and replied with a vague and voluntarily deceiving: “Maybe… or maybe not? That’s a secret~!”

…because it still was too risky to let someone know the truth about his love for Wolfram for now. Even if that someone was Yozak. There was still too much at stake… and now, after that he had messed up the other day, he might have lost every chance of winning that specific blond’s heart over, so there might be no reason to tell him about that at all for a start…

While talking – or not talking – about that, at last, they reached the tavern, so, without a further word, they just waved at each other and, with a reciprocal nod, they let the conversation die like that and they just split their ways for the moment. So, while Yozak went to do whatever he needed to for his boss, Ken entered and asked the bartender for a place in the back room.

Then he ordered the usual: a juice and a slice of cake.

-&-

When Yozak joined him at last, almost two hours later despite his previous forecasting of less than an hour, he wasn’t surprised to find the sage with a huge glass of juice in front of him while eating a cake. After twelve years he was used to that, so, without any apologetic words for his delay – that both knew wasn’t his fault – he just asked him: “How many of them do I have to pay this time?”

Ken smirked, mischievous.

“Six. And four glasses. But it seems that you are lucky today: there’s the young, attractive and very-much-smitten-over-you Sebastian at the counter today, so he might do you a good price if you smile enough to him…”

In reply, Yozak grinned back at the sage and then turned toward the owner’s son with a predator-like gaze that alone made the young blond flush to the tip of his ears.

“And if I decide to enjoy myself tonight it may be on the house entirely…”, Yozak suggested in a low voice and Ken started to laugh up his sleeve.

“Then drink to your heart’s content, but remember that you better not disappoint your sponsor…”

Five seconds later Sebastian was by their table throwing furtive glances at his crush and smiling so much that Ken was sure that it hurt.

“Hey, hello sunshine! You’re as radiant as ever today!”, Yozak started with his cheesy flatteries and the twenty-two years old young man’s face brightened even more than before if even possible.

“Hi Yozak! You too are as beautiful and kind as ever!”, he replied, but his eyes and his hasty breath shouted that he would have gladly changed the ‘beautiful and nice’ part in his previous sentence with a more fitting ‘sexy as hell’ if they had been alone in the first place… or if he just had the guts to say that out loud.

“Then, sweetheart: how about bringing me a beer for instance?”, the spy asked and the youngster brightly smiled at him and nodded before disappearing again.

And when the blond guy gave his back at them, Ken started to snicker.

“You’re such a dreamboat, my friend! Please don’t ever throw at me a glance like that one you gave the boy, or I might knock you out with a glass too much, kidnap you and force you to take me wildly before letting you go.”, he joked and Yozak, knowing that he wasn’t being serious in the slightest – because if anything was meant to happen between them, after twelve years he was sure that it would have already by now – just laughed together with him.

Then the boy came back with his beer, and another killing smile struck him… together with a light grope on that undeniably nice round rear and an almost casual “When do you get off, Sebby?” that made the guy freeze for a moment since until then Yozak had only verbally flirted with him while in the pub and nothing more.

And Ken had to cover his mouth, this time, in front of the ‘ _I must be dreaming_ ’ expression written all over Sebastian’s face. He could almost hear the screams of joy and anticipation going on in the boy’s head!

“At eight! Wanna eat together?”, Sebastian offered but Yozak glanced lasciviously at him and hinted in a sexy voice “Actually, I had something better in mind… but I’m sure we can discuss it later just the two of us… how does it sound to you?”

Then the guy started to compulsively nod and disappeared again, finally leaving them alone.

“…well: now that the bill and your night are set up, time to come to us…”, Ken declared, starting sneering and finishing his sentence in a pretty serious tone once the boy was far away.

Then Yozak turned serious on the spot too.

“So: what is it?”

“I want you to tell me in detail what brought Lord von Bielefeld to leave the castle for an entire month.”

At his words and his piercing eyes, Yozak gaped in surprise.

“Is that all? Really?”, the redhead asked appalled and Ken’s eyebrow tilted in irritation for a moment before a false smile showed on his face.

“Then consider yourself lucky for once, my dear friend.”

Then Yozak frowned.

“I didn’t mean to offend you, Ken. It’s just that everybody in the whole castle knows what happened… but more than that… Heika didn’t explain what happened to you this morning?”

He seemed surprised, but Ken’s expression didn’t change and he just spoke in a matter-of-fact tone.

“I guess he was ashamed to tell me, but I had planned to ask you from the start, so I don’t care about his reticence in the slightest.”

“But, after all, he would have been the best to ask to since it’s about their love life…”, Yozak commented, but Ken shook his head, his expression remaining unfathomable.

“Let me decide who’s best. So, you can start, please.”

“Weeeell…”, the spy exclaimed after a pause - and a pretty long one too - feeling slightly uneasy this time. “To make a long story short”, he started, but Ken butted in, cutting him off harshly before he could even start.

“No one asked you to make it short, so start from the beginning. If I wanted a summary, I would have asked anybody already without disturbing you, don’t you think?”, he pointed out and Yozak gulped in front of a bitterness that usually wasn’t meant for him.

And Ken knew – he knew that he was being too harsh for nothing – but the last three hours by himself there, waiting for Yozak, had taken a toll on him more than he could have ever imagined it being possible.

But despite that, Ken said nothing to apologize, because any word too much with someone as perceptive as Yozak was too risky for what he still wanted to be kept a secret to anybody but who already knew, that meant the shrine maidens, Ulrike, Shinou and Wolfram… because, after he left like that the other day, there was _no way_ that he hadn’t understood what was in his heart… wasn’t it?

And so Yozak started to explain, but it was so clear that the curious spy in him had sensed that his interest sounded fishy and that he was hiding something… so the conversation that followed turned into a wary one, where the redhead tried to stealthily pull any juicy information about that out of him and where he beat around the bush so to avoid all his attempts to know the truth behind his asking him of what had happened…

By the way, what he discovered was that, the same night after Wolfram had accompanied him to the temple, he had gone back several hours after than he had left him and he started a fuss with Shibuya out of nowhere, waking up half of the castle with his mad yells and complaints in the middle of the night about their – totally absent – intimate relationship.

“I want you to report to me the exact words”, Ken butted in then and Yozak raised an eyebrow.

“It’s quite embarrassing to report them, you know?”, the spy replied then. “…poor Lord von Bielefeld”, he commented, “he might have really hit rock bottom that night… Not even when he was a bratty spoiled child I heard him yell like that…”, he commented, but Ken only glared at him, waiting for what he had asked him.

And, in the end, like it was obvious, Yozak complied and told him, and he, on his behalf, only heaved a sigh in response… a very much frustrated one.

It was then, then, that the redhead took him totally by surprise with a bluntness that he had hoped to avoid but that he knew was a risk from the start, in truth.

“It had never been the First King, had it not? …you fooled me for twelve years, making me believe that every time you talked about yourself it was about your relationship with him.”

Yozak sighed while saying that, very much distinguishable in his tone and in his expression the disappointment of having been the only one to open up to him in the worthless attempt to show to him that he could trust him enough to talk to him, even if just a little, like friends would have done with each other.

“You guessed it on your own.”, Ken tried to defend himself, but Yozak sighed resigned and shook his head, that sense of betrayal making his voice waver.

“And you never corrected me. Was it too presumptuous of me to believe, in these last twelve years, that we were friends?”

At his guilty silence that replied to his bitter last question, then, Yozak only stood up and left, leaving Ken behind, who actually didn’t feel like he deserved to stop him since, sadly, he was right on all the line...

So, looking the redhead turn to the bartender and hearing him curtly tell him “Sorry, boy. Let’s do another time” while paying the bill, he watched Yozak’s back until he disappeared behind the door of the pub. Only then he sighed too, cursing at himself in his head for his own stupid lack of trust in people and hoping that he could find a way to make up with his only friend once he would have cooled off enough.


	12. Bitter disappointment

“You should go to the castle, my sage. You _really_ should!”, the First King mischievously whispered in Ken’s ear, appearing out of nowhere while the double black was watering his flowers in the garden; but, already used to Shinou’s pestering after ten days straight – and sometimes even several times a day –, Ken just closed his eyes, gritted his teeth and ignored him.

“Come on, dear! Are you trying to tell me that you’re truly not curious about the reason why I’m insisting?”, the blond added, amused and annoyed to be ignored at the same time.

“Why should I, you meddlesome nuisance of a king? You’re always like that, poking your nose in anything that isn’t your business in the first place just to pester me.”

Really: he was a patient man, but even his patience had a limit!

Just that moment a vestal approached them and the both of them turned silent, even if Shinou wore a knowing, amused grin on his face when she did.

“Yes? What is it?”, Ken broke the silence first, allowing the woman to speak. Then she briefly bowed her head before replying.

“Gurrier is here and asks for you. He’s waiting in the Waterfall Room.”

Taken aback by the news for its peculiarity even if they hadn’t fought, he just dismissed her with a nod.

Once back alone with Shinou, then, he glared at him, searching, this time, for anything that he might have missed while refusing to listen to what he was sure until that very moment that was just another of the man’s annoying attempts to harass him.

“Told you, haven’t I?”, the blond now openly laughed in his face, a mocking knowing smirk plastered there probably just to make him grow more annoyed than he already was by then.

“What the hell happened at the castle?”, he then queried to him in a glacial tone, his eyes piercing right through Shinou, but the other just snickered back, as much mocking as he could be.

“Why should I spoil it when he’s come here just in order to tell you since you didn’t follow my advice in these last ten days?”, the first king retorted still broadly smiling at him and Ken, exasperated, decided that it was useless to argue with him any further and, with a sigh, he just cut the air with a hand and left not deigning him of a reply.

-&-

Ken had to admit it: he was nervous, and it wasn’t just for the news Yozak was bringing – whichever they could be.

In the last month they never spoke to each other once after their argument in the pub, and he didn’t expect the man to decide to go see him, whichever the matter was… but maybe he wasn’t there on his own accord…

After all, it could be that Lord von Voltaire had sent him.

Unlikely, but still a possibility…

So he dismissed the maid out of the heavy doors to the Waterfall Room and, once alone in the hallway, he briefly closed his eyes and took a deep breath before opening the heavy shutters.

Oddly enough, at the redhead’s view, he just lowered his gaze and slightly more than whispered his name, his ever-there smile peculiarly missing.

…because apparently he felt more guilty than even he himself thought he was towards him.

At that sight, Yozak’s eyes widened in surprise, but he said nothing about it.

They studied at each other in silence for a couple of minutes, that heavy silence speaking more than any words for them, until Yozak broke it.

“I expected to see you right after the news spread out…”

A staggered silence followed his exclamation once more, and such a dumbfounded expression on the sage’s face was actually pretty rare to witness.

“…news?”, Ken asked at last, and the spy’s eyes widened again, both brows tilting up, incredulous.

“Are you trying to say that _in ten days_ no one told you about Lord von Bielefeld and Heika?”, the redheaded man asked, appalled by the mere thought that something like that could happen for real.

That instant: hope, fear, anticipation, anger and many more feelings crossed the sage’s face all at once, leaking out of the impenetrable wall that he always wore in order to hide his emotions and that it crumbled all at once at Yozak’s words, still too vague to make him one percent sure of their meaning, but also still too vague to kill his hopes for good.

And that is why he was afraid.

Ken tried twice to speak, to ask him to be more specific than that, but his voice failed him both times and he just ended opening and closing his mouth again and swallowing hard.

In the end, it was Yozak who spoke first again.

“When Lord von Bielefeld came back, first thing he asked Heika to follow him and, after three hours locked in the Maoh’s office, they just came out and announced the annulment of their engagement. And I know nothing more than this because Lord von Voltaire spotted me eavesdropping on them and brought me away by force despite he himself was clearly dying to know what was happening inside.”, he added, just to be sure and still resentful towards the man.

But where Yozak was now expecting a real interrogatory knowing him, all that he received was a stunned silence in reply.

“…by the way”, the spy added then, “even if I heard just the first few minutes of their discussion, it seems to me that it wasn’t anything unexpected by Heika. Quite the contrary, in truth… but really!”, his tone changed again, from serious to stunned and upset, “Did really Heika not inform you about it? And despite the almost _idyllic_ relationship that they now share! Because, really: I never saw those two so happy to share their time together in twelve damn years!”

While Yozak complained to his friend’s behalf, Ken’s shoulders started to tremble and after a few silent snorts he abruptly cracked in a loud cackle that left the redhead speechless. And that lasted for a few minutes, his eyes watery… but maybe he just deserved this. Or it was just the only result he could expect after his choice to remain in that world where he wasn’t really considered a person but more like a deity like his incorporeal once lover was now perceived?

That moment he truly understood how Yozak had felt that evening in the pub, because, even if after four millennia he had learned not to trust anybody completely and to be alone, with no need for others, in the deep of his heart he had trusted Yuuri to be different… he had trusted him to consider him his friend, but even _he_ had forgotten about him now that he didn’t need him.

At that last thought, his laughter turned softer and bitterer, and suddenly a river of unstoppable tears started to flow through his eyes and along his cheeks.

In order to hide them, instead of uselessly trying to wipe them away with his hands and sleeves, Ken just gave the other his shoulder, but Yozak, ignoring his status more than any other time in the sage’s presence, reached him and hugged him from behind instead, his forehead against the other’s head, sinking in the black and thick hair of his friend.

“Finally your heart showed.”, he whispered and, as if he had turned a switch on with those four words, Ken started to soundly sob and growl in anger and pent-up frustration in his embrace, freeing his emotions all at once like he had never done before in front of another.

And when he finally calmed down enough, he didn’t dare turn towards Yozak because he couldn’t show him his messed up face, even if he had heard him cry and he had felt his body shamefully shake against his solid chest and in his strong arms.

He really couldn’t.

But still: Yozak deserved an apology from him even more than an easier for him ‘thank you’ for his uncalled but definitely appreciated support and friendship.

So he straightened his shoulders and, still in his arms, in a hoarse but firm voice he finally spoke.

“I’ve been a fool, and an idiot… and I wronged you, the truly only one in this world, it seems, who really sees me as a living man and not as a shadow of the past. I’ve been alone for so long that I convinced myself that I didn’t need people, that I didn’t need friends… that I didn’t need a heart, and I didn’t notice that it was instead what I craved the most.”, he made a pause and heaved a long sigh before continuing. “I’m sorry for having taken you for granted. I truly am unworthy of your friendship, Yozak. But I am also truly grateful to you for your trust and consideration since the first day we met.”

To that, Yozak remained silent, but he didn’t let him go from his embrace, and so they stayed like that, in the comfort of their reciprocal warmth, for a while, until Ken added something more, in a half regretful confession.

“I liked you since the moment you told me, from the other side of the door of my cell in Flynn’s mansion, that you believed me, without a single doubt in your heart, and if Wolfram hadn’t existed, I would have courted you until you would have fallen for me as hard as I did.”

And this, at last, produced a reaction and a bitter snort left Yozak’s throat before his reply.

“And actually you wouldn’t have had to work too hard in order to accomplish your goal if you had just tried.”, he declared, and this time it was Ken’s turn to snort in regret, but it became soon a soft chuckle, the atmosphere now turning gradually lighter and the tension somehow finally broken.

“Such a pity, then!”, the double black commented in a light-hearted voice and Yozak burst out laughing in reply.

“Definitely a pity!”

But he really thought so, and he was sure that he wasn’t the only one…

At last, then, Ken freed himself from the other’s embrace together while Yozak let him go.

“And now”, the sage declared turning serious again all of a sudden, “there’s someone who needs to get a piece of my mind, so, come: let’s go to the castle together.”, and so they went to the stable to get their horses ready, because Shinou could wait his turn to get what he deserved. After all, it was nothing new in his behavior toward him – or anybody else – and he had just acted annoyingly as he did all the time.

But Yuuri, on the other hand, had truly wronged him this time, totally failing the friendship relationship that _he_ had first affirmed they shared!


	13. Is it what you call friendship?

The guard in front of the main door of the building watched at the Great Sage approaching by horse at full gallop and dismounting without a word and just leaving the reins to him with alarm in his eyes, but the double black said nothing and just stormed inside, heading straight to the Maoh’s office and hoping, for Yuuri’s sake, that he didn’t have to look for him around the castle or he had promised himself that he would have throttled the man the moment he would have found him if that had been the case.

Luckily for the Maoh, he was inside: his voice was audible from two hallways away.

So, with absolutely no concern at all for whom he had thought that was his friend but who had failed him and for whoever was inside with him, he just slammed the door open and stormed inside.

“Shibuya!! Why didn’t you tell me----”, he started in a shout, furious, but the moment that he realized _who_ was with him, with a wide smile on his face and caring eyes pointed at Yuuri, all the venomous words he had ready for him died in his throat and almost choked him.

 

A tense silence followed, broken at last by Wolfram, who this time managed to force a new smile to his ex-fiancé after he had frozen the moment when his eyes had met Murata’s, and who accurately avoided to look at the sage after the awkwardness that had followed.

 

“…I guess that I’ll leave the two of you alone, then…” and that said the blond stood up and made to leave, but Yuuri just stopped him.

“No, Wolf: stay.”, he stated, gently but firmly. “After all”, he explained, “that’s something concerning the both of us…”, and Ken noticed the blond’s shoulders getting stiff at what sounded like an order from Yuuri despite the kind tone of his voice.

Only later he realized that, on his behalf, at Yuuri’s suggestion, for a moment he had stopped breathing.

And when he realized that the only vacant place in the small living corner Yuuri had insisted to have inside his office was next to Wolfram, he just felt the blood leaving his face and he seriously regretted to have stormed inside without thinking beforehand of the possible consequences.

Then, once the three of them were finally sat together, Yuuri spoke.

“I’m sorry, Murata…”, he said apologetically, but for some reason Ken sensed that, more than sorry, he seemed embarrassed. “I know that I should have told you, but really I didn’t know how to start… I couldn’t just send you a pigeon with a message that said that Wolfram and I broke up, could I?”, he attempted to justify himself for his lack of consideration towards him, but how in the world could Yuuri really believe that that could be enough of an excuse for his betrayal of their friendship?!

“You could have come to the temple, then, or, for example, you could have sent me a message asking for my presence here! For all the Gods’ sake, Shibuya! Do you really see me as one of your friends?”, Ken complained, hurt and resentful like he hadn’t sounded nor felt for a very, very long time.

On the other hand, in the silence that followed, at his side Wolfram heaved a sigh.

“And here I thought that you were like that just towards me…”, the blond spouted out – his words clearly meant for the Maoh – before realizing that he wasn’t just thinking that into his head and gaining back both the other’s attention, judging from his face, without really desiring for it.

“It seems that our Maoh is just feather-brained by nature…”, the sage promptly backed Wolfram’s comment in a spiteful and resentful tone, just equally unthinking.

“Don’t start to offend, Murata, come on!”, Yuuri started to protest then, not noticing for a moment the awkwardness of the back and forth between Murata and Wolfram and probably, judging by his fidgeting and flushing in clear shame every time he threw a glance at his ex-fiancé, regretting to have asked him too to stay. “I said that I’m sorry already! What else do you want me to say to you?!”

“Maybe he just wants to hear you say that you’re the greatest of wimps on both worlds and see you kneel in front of him asking for his forgiveness… and why not? Better be in regretful tears for your lack of consideration towards him.”, the blond evilly suggested, and while Yuuri started to protest at his too harsh words, without thinking and out of pure reflex Wolfram threw a conspiratorial glance at the sage under the other’s silent astonishment at his totally unexpected words in his support.

Only then, in front of Murata’s shock for his words, he seemed to remember how he had left him the last time he had gone to meet him at the temple and of the unsightly weak himself that he had shown him that day.

Ashamed to no end, Wolfram’s face burned in mortification and, in the vain attempt to hide it, he abruptly jumped on his feet.

“By the way…”, he burst out forcing a smiling face and a nonchalant tone, “I just remembered that Gwendal asked me to run an errand for him, so, if both of you might excuse me…” and, this said, without waiting for a reply, he just headed to the door the fastest he could without actually running and left, leaving the sage finally alone with Yuuri, who was unsure of what had just happened.

With his eyebrows furrowed, the Maoh, in fact, watched questioningly at Murata.

“…what was that?”, he asked him at last, utterly confused, but Ken didn’t reply, shaken for some reason, there, in front of him and with his eyes still on the now once again closed door.

But that moment didn’t last long, and the second later Yuuri doubted what he had just witnessed crossing the other’s face, quickly replaced by an icy glare and by words full of venom.

“So is it what you call friendship?!”, he snapped at him, rancorous, and Yuuri averted his eyes in shame.

“…I’m sorry, Murata… I never meant to hurt you… it had just been so sudden, and when I realized that Wolfram and I were finally getting along just fine and far better than before after---”

“Shut. Up.”, he intimated, his voice a couple of tones lower than usual, cutting his blabber short, exasperated, and he stood up abruptly, every fiber in his body screaming his disappointment and anger.

Then, throwing a darting glare at the Maoh, Ken gave him the back and stumped to the door, where he stopped with his hand on the handle before lowering it.

“I believed you when you told me that we were friends.”, he said without turning back and facing the wooden shutter, “Maybe I shouldn’t have.”, he sentenced. “But don’t you worry too much, _Shibuya_ ”, and he actually marked on the impersonal name or, better, surname, “after all”, he explained in a flat tone still giving him his shoulders, “it’s not your fault but mine, because it was me who believed your words in the first place, letting my guard down around you. I shouldn’t have.”

Then, with these bitter, hurt words, he left without turning back and went to retrieve his horse to go back to the temple.


	14. Reconciliation

Ken passed the next several days in an apathy that he hadn’t felt in a few centuries, locked in his quarters or cloistered in his garden, refusing to speak to anybody, that included Shinou, Ulrike and even Yozak – who had come just to see him a couple of times – for almost three weeks, when, summoned by Lord von Voltaire to the castle, he was forced to snap out of his languor.

So he collected himself again, re-building up his shields higher than before, and left to the castle with a renewed smile plastered on his face, feigning that nothing happened, denying that he was hurt and disappointed, that he felt betrayed, and treating the fact as if it was an event of one of his past lives: not like his own, but like someone else’s business entirely.

Like that he had been able to act just the same as before around Yuuri, like if nothing had happened in the first place, smiling and joking around like before… but a good observer would have noticed that something in his eyes, if all, betrayed his true feelings when everything else still kept them concealed behind his mask.

The Maoh, on his behalf, had attempted to reconcile with Murata, but every time he had actively tried, Ken had shaken it off as if it was nothing, as if the coldness Yuuri sometimes felt coming from him when they happened to be just the two of them was all in his head.

On the other hand, what was funny was that, where he was perfectly able to act like normal around Yuuri despite how much he had been disappointed in him, around Wolfram he didn’t know how to act and everything he did felt awkward and wrong. Not to mention that Wolfram had started to avoid him just as much as he did.

Not that they really had all these occasions to meet in the last four and a half months in truth since he went to the castle only when Lord von Voltaire called for him, and it surely wasn’t often, nor for long.

Despite that, every damn time he went, he always crossed path with the blond demon somewhere, was it a hallway, the courtyard, the gates or whatever: it seemed that the more he didn’t want to meet him, the more the chances to cross path with him grew for some reason.

“Damn Murphy!”, he murmured in complaint between his teeth that last time, making Yozak – who was talking about something Ken forgot the moment he saw Wolfram appear from a corner in the hallway, stop the moment he noticed him and then turn one hundred eighty and take another route to wherever he was going – stop midsentence and glance at him with a questioning look on his face. Then the ginger man turned and understood, if not the comment in itself, at least its general meaning.

“You should talk it out with him, Ken. It’s freezing here just watching at you two being at eyesight.”, he commented, but the sage just sighed and shrugged as if to say that there was nothing he could do to change that so, like every other time that Yozak had attempted to touch this topic, the conversation quickly moved to something else – something less sensitive.

-&-

Ken was ready to leave with his horse at hand by the entrance of the barn that Yuuri blocked his route standing in front of him with a really stern expression on his face.

“Do you mind to delay your departure? I would like to have a chat with you.”, the king proclaimed and, since it peculiarly sounded like an order, Ken slightly frowned in reply but, at the end, he curtly nodded and, without another word, he just turned to bring the horse back and he tied its rein on a bar not too far from the exit, hoping that it wouldn’t have taken long.

So he followed the Maoh on the walls and he saw him ask the guard on patrol up there to leave them their privacy and move to another sector while they were there.

“What is it, Shibuya?”, he queried him at last once they were finally alone, not really knowing what to expect from him and his peculiar behavior.

“I want to know what happened between you and Wolfram. I thought you made a move on him after what had happened in my office that day and the way you both acted, but Wolf said that it’s nothing like that and he even reproached me for having thought you could be able to do something like that when we still were engaged, but the more I think about it, the more something sounds fishy. So, if it’s not that, tell me why you avoid each other since then.”

Yuuri’s tone was stern, but did he really believe that he had any right to claim a reply from him after the totally nonexistent consideration he had shown he had towards him?

Murata scoffed, darkly amused by the other’s pretensions.

“I wouldn’t humor your curiosity even if you were my friend, so, since you showed me that we aren’t, why in the world should I do that?”, he retorted, biting, and Yuuri’s mouth widened in pure shock to the sage’s unexpectedly harsh words since, after that infamous day in his office, Murata had treated him like he had always done before.

“…Murata…” was all the other managed to reply to that, but when Ken, after a mocking snicker in front of his reaction, made to turn his back to him and leave, Yuuri just grabbed him by the elbow, stopping him.

Then, without further notice for his following gesture nor releasing his arm from his grip, Yuuri deeply bowed at him.

“I’m really, really sorry. It exists no word or explanation that can justify what I did to you or which can wholly describe how a jerk I’ve been, and I don’t deserve your forgiveness, but please, try to solve that mess with Wolfram. And not because I’m asking you to do it, but for yourself and for him. Please!”, Yuuri repeated, literally begging at this stage and, for a moment, Ken remained silent, pondering how to reply to those words and to Yuuri’s deference.

But despite his wisdom, this time he still couldn’t let it pass so easily, because the wound he had inflicted him was still bleeding profusely in his heart.

“What I really don’t understand, Shibuya”, Ken started then in a flat, detached tone, “is why you’re not telling this to Wolfram instead of being here to ask me something like that since I’m clearly no friend to you or, if I am, I’m in a lower position in your list than him.”

“Don’t talk gibberish, Murata!”, Yuuri snapped at last, “I may have wronged you and you’ve all the rights to be angry at me, but this is too much, because, really, you’re one to talk! You never opened your heart to me, never confided in me in the first place, so you’re _in no position_ to reprimand me so harshly after you did the same for all these past years that we know each other!”, he barked back, totally fed up. “I may be a hypocrite, but you’re no less than me and, probably, even a worse one than I am and than I’ll always be! So stop acting childish and just do some soul searching yourself before accusing me of lack of consideration towards you and your feelings, ok?!”, he yelled in one breath and, when he finished, Ken was standing there, merely watching at him in silence with blank eyes.

“So”, the Maoh decided to add a last thing – and maybe the most important one – before leaving him to think about his words, “talk to Wolfram and just tell him you love him, because I’m fairly sure that he feels the same towards you.”

That said, he heaved a very long, deep sigh, and this time the sage gasped in shock to his last words, his black eyes wide open.

“What?!”, he paled and, the moment later, he blushed in mortification and astonishment, and Yuuri sighed again.

“…it’s blatant.”, he pointed out at his exclamation but it didn’t help the sage to recover from the shock, so Yuuri decided to explain.

“If you didn’t love him, you should have been able to act normal towards him as much as you acted normal towards me in the last four and a half months despite your true feelings. And you couldn’t. So stop acting stupid and just tell him, because everyone is fed up with you two.”, he complained and, at the last reproach, Ken raised an eyebrow because it wasn’t something that Shibuya would have normally said, but he just continued to say nothing.

They watched at each other in silence for a few more minutes, one shocked and the other exasperated – and for once the roles were reversed – until Yuuri broke the silence with the umpteenth sigh and, patting Ken on the shoulder, he just left him to think about his words without adding anything else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Actually, I didn't plan the second part of the chapter, but since Catreader showed expectations in her comment to the drama in the previous chapter, I decided to develop it and solve it (more or less).  
> But since the story is about Murata and Wolfram and THEIR relationship, I decided to leave it at that, implying a future reconciliation after their little chat here.  
> By the way, I hope you enjoyed because next chapter will be the last one and I'll try to write a little, well deserved, smut as epilogue to this story and 'The Sage's Courtship Dance'!
> 
> ...but really, the previous story was supposed to be a one-shot when I started it and it came out 18 chapters long, and this one had been started just to arrive to next chapter and, even if with just 15 chapters, it's even longer than the previous one....... I just want to die! XD


	15. The blooming Wolfram

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm extremely sorry that it took so long for the last chapter.... but it's here at last! Hope you'll enjoy! :D

When Murata came back, he talked to no one and went straight to his quarters, he locked himself in and sank in the armchair under the window. He closed his eyes and a moment later a well-known voice broke the silence.

“Score one for the Maoh, my sage.”, the first king mocked him with a grin on his face and an amused tone, and Ken’s arm moved on its own: with his eyes still closed he instinctively grabbed the first book on the high pile at the side of his seat and he threw it in the direction of the irritating voice, missing his target only because he swiftly dodged it.

At the loud ‘tonk’ of the tome against the wall the sage finally opened his eyes and scoffed in disappointment.

“Now, now!” Shinou protested at that, amusement still lingering there despite the cold greeting. “No need to resort to violence, since you should be the first one to know that it merely shows that you are the one at fault, as you far too often reminded me in the past…”, he smugly retorted, a grin curving up his lips in a scornful way.

“Convenient, for you, retorting my own words to me, isn’t it?”

“What?”, Shinou mocked him then, “Would you like to suggest that your wise advices apply to everybody but you?”

At these words, Ken only snorted, fixed his gaze at a point a bit on the left of the other’s shoulder so to avoid his eyes but, at the same time, to keep up appearances and a semblance of righteousness like every other – rare – time that he happened to be in the wrong, and he waved his hand in dismissal of the matter.

“Bullseye, my dear. No point in denying that now. And also, it’s a few years now that I tell you that you should make your move, and, seriously, now that he freed himself of his previous boundary, I don’t see why you’re still hesitating.”

“Oh, I’m sure of that, because there’s no way that you can understand. You never understood when you were blood and bones, and there’s no way that you can understand now despite the time you have lived… or at least that _your soul_ has lived!”, Murata snapped back, too tired and irritated to just accept the truth of Shinou’s remark and too proud to accept that their usual roles had been reversed, putting him in the role of the one at fault.

 _Utterly_ , undeniably at fault.

But those last words offended the just as proud first king who, annoyed at him, just grunted and, retorting an “if you want to brood, just do it by yourself”, he disappeared.

-&-

But knowing to be the one at fault and accepting it wasn’t the same thing, and another half month passed, between Shinou’s witty remarks here and there and his own self-loathing.

He even refused to go to the castle when summoned by Lord von Voltaire twice with the excuse of having to fulfill some very important duties by the temple that forbid him to leave for a while.

…until he couldn’t stand it anymore.

Because every one of them was right, and because he wanted Wolfram, or, if Wolfram didn’t want him, he just wanted that limbo he was living in to dissipate and to forget.

It was the twenty-fifth time that Wolfram had a day off since their promise that he had attended only once until then – the first time.

The twenty-fifth time that he could have come to see him and didn’t.

It was enough time to brood over it, enough time to stand the awkwardness whenever they met in a corridor by chance.

When he arrived by the castle it was evening already.

“Do you know where I can find Lord von Bielefeld?”, he curtly asked the guard by the gate without the usual smile or the usual greetings he dispensed to everybody indiscriminately.

The soldier, one of Conrad’s men, blinked at him twice before replying.

“It’s training time… you should find him in the courtyard.”

At the answer, Ken stopped and the confusion might be visible on his face for at least an instant because the man explained.

“The day after tomorrow is Lady Greta’s birthday, so this week he delayed his day off.”

Everything that came out of his mouth at that was an “Oh”: he had totally forgotten…

And as if it wasn’t enough, Yuuri was running towards him.

He remembered to thank the soldier at last second before walking forward in the Maoh’s direction with his horse still at hand, and when he noticed Lord von Christ running behind him he guessed that he might have seen him arrive from a window during one of his lessons.

“Murata!!”, the demon king cried while waving at him to keep his attention. And when Gunter noticed him too, his violet eyes switched from teary to sparkling, and another cry, this time of “Your Eminence”, echoed the first one.

This time he couldn’t refrain from heaving a sigh.

“Well, hello”, he feigned a nonchalance he wasn’t feeling and he forced a practiced smile on his face.

“Are you finally here for Wolf?”, Yuuri asked him with no tact at all.

He frowned, irritated, and instead of replying to his question he only asked back a wary “why” that made the Maoh answer with a similar frown of the one he had just received. But he hadn’t the time to say anything else because Gunter interrupted them with the usual enthusiasm.

“Your Eminence! It was so very long since the last time I met you!! Gwendal informed me that your duties by the temple forbid you to leave for a while, and before, I had never the chance to meet you because of my duties! I’m so glad that this time we could finally encounter each other again!”

“Yeah, sure. I’m very pleased, but regretfully I’m in a hurry today…”

“In fact!” Yuuri stepped in, pressing. “He finished early today and he took a habit of having a ride before dinner every day, now”, and he couldn’t finish that Murata actually caught a glimpse of the blond in question enter the barn.

“He? Who are you talking about, Your Majesty?”, Gunter asked back, curious like a monkey as always, and when Yuuri replied just “Wolfram” Gunter’s forehead creased in a perplexed frown, but by then Murata was back again on his horse, heading to the stable and already far ahead.

-&-

“Fancy finding you here of all places, my lord”, Ken started still on his horse back from the barn’s door. “I was leaving when I noticed you enter here”, he lied with such practice that no one would have noticed. “I was ready to head back to the temple”, he went on flawless, “and you seem ready to leave… won’t you kindly escort me back, then?”, he suggested. He made sure to smile while speaking, but he could tell from a glance at Wolfram that it might have been quite a feral one and that he was leaving him not much of a choice about that matter. “Obviously if you have nothing else to do instead.”, he added, but after Shibuya’s words a moment before he already knew that it surely wasn’t the case.

Despite that, he could sense the hesitance in the man standing stiff in front of him with his horse already at hand and no way to lie about his intentions to leave.

“…in truth, I…”, Wolfram attempted to decline the invitation, but he hadn’t come here that day just to hear a refusal before even starting.

“Please, my lord”, he promptly interrupted him. “I would like to have a word with you. I don’t like this last development between us”, he flatly explained. “It’s exhausting, and I can’t stand it anymore. Not after these last happenings, at least.”

A brief surprise crossed the blond’s face at his for once honest and open complaint, and, at that, Wolfram briefly nodded in the end and prepared to follow him, even if still reluctant.

 

The trip back to the temple passed in silence and the tension grew so thick between them that it could almost be cut with a knife: he rode ahead of Wolfram and he never turned back towards him this time.

He could feel the weight of the other’s stare at his back, but he just ignored it, concentrating on the aim he had left the temple with an hour and a half earlier.

When they finally reached the gates, then, after hinting at the guard to leave them, he turned at last.

“Now, my lord”, he started, breaking the heavy silence that had engulfed them until then, his voice grave and his face peculiarly somber, “you have your last chance to decide if you want to leave, and then _everything_ that happened between us among these walls will be forgotten for good…”, he made a pause for emphasis, his eyes piercing and his voice mildly seductive. “…or if you want to enter.” He made another pause, and this time the shadow of a smile curved up the corner of his lips for a moment before going back to a grave expression, so unusual to be seen on him, “If you will follow me inside”, he went on, “I will show you what I denied you last time.”

At that, he saw the blond demon in front of him gasp, his eyes wide, somewhere in the middle between fear and anticipation.

…maybe he really had a chance, he thought.

After a pause that seemed to last an eternity, Wolfram finally spoke, and despite the fact that by his later reply it might have not seemed like it, the words that left the blond’s mouth surprised him.

“…persuade me to stay”, the demon whispered, uncertain but willing to accept him, in a way…

“No, my lord”, he replied instead, reiterating his denial. “I won’t say a word more than I already said. From this moment on”, he stated in no more than a whisper, his tone final, almost harsh, “it is only your choice to take.”

For a couple of minutes, they remained there, still.

He supposed Wolfram was having a panic attack, because his breath had become rough and he was as white as a sheet, his eyes blank, but, despite that, he patiently waited. And when, in the end, Wolfram finally dismounted, he noticed that he himself had kept his breath for almost all the time.

 

He made way, guiding the blond through the inner courtyards and porches of the temple, where very few outsiders could boast of having been in four whole millennia.

Then, two corners from his private garden, he abruptly stopped in his track, and Wolfram, who still was pretty stiff and lost in thought, bumped into him.

“Sorr---“, the demon started to apologize, his voice shamefully trembling, but Ken quickly turned to face him at that and, watching at him in the eye, he promptly covered his words with his.

“Close your eyes and take my hand”, he ordered, “I will guide you from here on.”

Wolfram blinked a few times in evident surprise and shock, but in the end he accepted the hand offered to him and obeyed, blindly following him while the flower scent intensified around them.

He stopped in the exact middle of the garden.

Wolfram’s hand was slightly trembling in his, but the blond never opened his eyes, neither just to take a peek or when he almost stumbled on his feet… but he had no doubt about it, not even for a second, because he knew that Wolfram would have rather died than break his word.

He remained a long moment there to look at him, transfixed by his astounding beauty, with the blond’s now sweaty hand into his, until his body moved on its own and he found himself at less than an inch from him, ready to kiss him on the lips.

He stopped just in time, but after a quick pondering, he asked himself why in the world he should have refrained and, for the first time in a long time, he found no reason to do so.

So he lightly exhaled and, closing his eyes too, he finally brushed his lips against Wolfram’s.

The contact lasted no more than a couple of seconds, and when he opened his eyes again he found the blond staring at him in surprise and shock but – thanks to all the gods above – not horror.

Then he heard a strangled “what” leaving the other’s throat, but everything else got lost somewhere along the way out while he looked around in mesmerized disbelief.

“All you see at your feet started with a single flower eleven years ago”, he started to explain then, “when we came back from Dai Shimaron.”, and he was the first one to find peculiar the unevenness of his own voice, clear trace of his inner turmoil. “That day I made a promise to myself…”, he continued then after a brief pause and, for a moment, he diverted his eyes in shame for the confession that was going to come, “a selfish one, and a quite unkind one towards my best friend, actually, if everything between you two would have worked out just fine…”. Then, after the umpteenth pause, he explained. “If from that single flower I reached one thousand and one, like the nights in that story that you forced me to translate for you after you heard about it from Jennifer-san the second time you had visited Earth, then I would have confessed my feelings to you, regardless of everything and everyone else… even you.”, he concluded, their gazes locked.  
“They are one thousand seven hundred and fifty-four…”, then he bent and picked up one that he offered him. “Three…”

He witnessed Wolfram’s expression change many times in that time frame, until he saw him burst out in an earnest laughter.

“You’re crazy!”, that beautiful angel exclaimed at last, his eyes almost teary in what, by the way, seemed more than just amusement. “They’re so many!!”

He heaved a sigh in front of his innocent soul, totally disarmed.

“They just need devotion and love to bloom beautifully”, he replied in something like a trance, fascinated by the other’s sweet laughter and astounding loveliness. “Such as the beautiful creature they took their name from”, he declared, and Wolfram blushed hard at those last words, there, a few mere inches from him.

But what was a beautiful miracle, in his eyes, was seeing the blond throw his arms at his neck and kiss him hungrily despite the flushed color that, from his cheeks, spread to the tip of his ears in evident embarrassment for his previous comment.

And when maybe the boldest of challenges left Wolfram’s lips in reply to those words – “ _show me how beautifully I can bloom_ ” he had dared say to him with a tempting bright smile – the last bit of sense and rationality that were left in him until that moment abandoned him for good and, with a hungry groan, he just tugged him to his own quarters with the clear intent to have him as soon as possible without the risk of intrusions or interruptions of any sort.

 

The moment the door closed behind their back Wolfram was already tearing off his own clothes in a frenzy and with a lustful mist clouding his eyes that he had almost lost hope to ever be able to see into them.

He ate him with his eyes, mooning over every bit of skin that freed from his clothes at lightning speed until, in less than a minute, the blond was standing totally naked in front of him, his erection beautifully exposed and begging for attention.

He felt his mouth grow dry while all his heat converged in his groin while watching from a short distance, but still a distance, the incredible beauty of the creature standing in front of his eyes.

At that, he noticed Wolfram hesitate for a moment and furiously flush in front of his still being fully dressed and apparently not intentioned to change that state, in utter contrast with his total nudity; but before the other could try to cover himself in shame and self-consciousness, Ken slightly raised his forefinger in a silent admonition and, with just the tip of his finger brushing against a point in the middle of his bare chest, he made him move backwards, drastically changing the pace of their previous rush of passion until that moment. Then, when Wolfram was finally trapped between his finger and the wooden door without a way of escape, he started to swiftly and lightly trace his abs in a straight line that started at his mid-chest and, slowly crossing his navel, continued down and down and along the whole shaft to the tip of his manhood, muffling a strangled gasp with a light stolen kiss the moment he tapped it just to make it shake slightly in order to elicit an even stronger reaction in the man that was now soon going to be his lover.

And Wolfram gasped and moaned against his mouth, shaking from head to toe for the mixture of sensations, the impatient heat transmuted into reverent hesitation.

Ken felt a smirk take shape on his own face, his eyes locked with the blond’s who looked at him, judging by his lost expression, not knowing what to expect from him from then on.

But he gave him not a word of explanation or reassurance: he just started to leave butterfly kisses all over the other’s frozen still body, starting from the neck and shoulders, passing by the hardened nipples and then, from the point where his forefinger had previously traced an imaginary line, bending on his knees, he replayed that same line with light pecks, down to the tip of his shaft.

He noticed that since the moment he had crossed his navel Wolfram had stopped breathing, but when, abruptly, he took him in his mouth, the blond let out a strangled cry and, in an unconditioned instinct, he pushed forward and, trembling hard, he grabbed his hair to keep him in place, making him slightly choke.

And since Wolfram was so much into it already, he decided that it was the right moment to make him understand which were his plans for him in the short term: so he sneakily moved his hand and poked a finger at his entrance, making the blond visibly flinch in return and come back to his senses.

“I’m a top!”, the blond cried suddenly on the defensive, panicking and pushing him away since the door prevented him from moving backwards, but he only raised his gaze on him and slowly stood up in order to watch at him straight in the eyes.

Wolfram, in front of him, froze still at the piercing glare he received.

“Not today”, he sentenced in a sharp whisper and a tone that brooked no argument at a few inches from his face and Wolfram, normally so apt to protest for every little thing, this time just lowered his eyes in a sheepish way and, at his second attempt to prepare him for what was going to come, he only jerked slightly but let him have his way with his body, soon starting to feel it under his expert hands and tongue-job.

When the demon’s legs started to teeter, he decided that it was time to move to the bed.

“Hang on to me”, he cooed in his ear and, while still saying it, he slightly bent towards him and grabbed the other’s thighs to pick him up in his arms; and he was pleasantly surprised when Wolfram instinctively threw his arms around his neck and laced his legs around his waist, now fully complying with his urgings.

Once on the bed Murata continued from where he had stopped, but Wolfram was still too tight.

“Relax a bit more, and take it like a lesson for when you’ll have to do the same to me”

And to those words, Wolfram jumped up in surprise.

“What?!”, he asked appalled, and Murata only frowned at him in reply.

“…can I really… too…?”, the blond timidly explained, still uncertain to have heard right, but he now sneered at him, amused.

“I said ‘not today’, did I not? Never spoken about other times…”, he prompted with a knowing smirk. “And also: wasn’t it you the one who asked me to show you how beautifully you could bloom, flower?”

Hearing his own words offered back at him this way turned Wolfram’s face to flame, but the arousal was far greater than the embarrassment by now, it seemed, because the beautiful demon in front of his eyes suddenly hugged him hard against his bare chest and whispered in his ear “Then show me. I’m ready.”

And how in this world or the other could he ever disregard such high expectations that his lover had built towards him in a moment like that?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, the final is slightly open, but it's not difficult to guess what will come later... a lot of happiness and shared and reciprocal pleasure! XD  
> I hope you liked it..... and sorry again that it took so long..... but now at least this one is finished!  
> Thanks a lot for reading and following me! Really! I love you!


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